Travellers hoping to get away for the bank holiday weekend faced a slow start
to their journeys today with delays on the roads and disruption at the
country's biggest airport.

Many families are expected to try to escape the dismal British weather to seek some sunshine after one of the coldest springs in nearly 30 years.

However, flights from London's Heathrow airport were still being affected by a backlog following the emergency landing of a British Airways jet that turned back shortly after taking off for Oslo with smoke pouring from an engine.

For those remaining in the UK, road closures in the West Country made journeys slow following two fatal crashes.

The M5 was closed after a woman was killed as she drove the wrong way along the southbound carriageway, near Weston-super-Mare in Somerset.

The woman, in her late 20s or early 30s, died after her blue Ford Ka collided with four vehicles on the motorway.

The A30 was also closed for most of the morning near Hayle in west Cornwall after a 38-year-old man died in a crash.

He was pronounced dead at the scene following the single-vehicle accident at 3am, while his female passenger was taken to the Royal Cornwall Hospital in Truro with minor injuries, a Devon and Cornwall police spokesman said.

In Kent, a motorcyclist was seriously injured when a bike collided with a car in Furnace Lane at Lamberhurst, near Tunbridge Wells, at around 10.40am on Saturday morning.

The accident led to the road being closed at the junction with Free Heath Road for emergency teams to deal with the incident, a Kent Police spokesman said. No other casualties are thought to be involved.

Meanwhile, motorists faced delays after a crash involving a cyclist and two cars in West Malling, Kent. The cyclist was taken to hospital in Pembury with a head injury.

Kent Police said another casualty was taken to hospital with a collar bone injury but neither are thought to be life-threatening.

Temperatures are expected to reach up to 18C in some parts of the country, although there could be some frosts in rural parts of southern England on Sunday morning.

Mark Tanzer, the chief executive of the Association of British Travel Agents, said families were heading abroad for high temperatures and sun as the bank holiday weekend coincides with the half term school holiday.

"Families are flying to Spain, in particular the Balearic and Canary islands and those heading to Turkey are in for a scorcher, with temperatures set to hit 40 degrees next week," he said.

"North Africa is also popular at this time of year offering guaranteed warmth and sunshine."